


our hearts were on display

by WashiEaglewings



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Baking, Disney Cameos, F/M, Fluff without Plot, Gift Giving, Pre-BBS, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, on a scale of one to my usual hundred sads, post-kh3, this one is like a five?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-22
Updated: 2017-10-22
Packaged: 2019-01-21 05:11:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12450300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WashiEaglewings/pseuds/WashiEaglewings
Summary: When you care about someone, you have to give them something.A love story, in five gifts.





	our hearts were on display

**Author's Note:**

> Please based Nomura, let these two be happy.

 Aqua is nine years old and thinks herself wise when she tells Terra, “When you care about someone, you have to give ‘em something. That’s just how it is.”

“But your stuff is always made,” he says, his legs dangling from the dining table. “What does _that_ mean?”

It means she’d never had enough money to go into a shop and buy something shiny. Making things, though, that she could do. Baking was a skill she picked up young, and though she was years and maybe lifetimes away from “perfect” she was certainly “passable.” Maybe even good, if Eraqus’s clean plates and warm smiles are anything to go by.

“Then it’s extra special,” she says, turning on the tap. Cocoa powder stains the tapwater brown, and for a moment she watches it swirl down the drain and out of sight. She grabs a cloth and wipes her hands down, taking a few seconds to admire her brownies. She’d crushed the nuts herself, with help from a rolling pin. “Because when you eat it, or look at it, you think of the person who worked so hard to make you smile.”

Terra leans his head on a fist, eying the brownies. “You’re such a girl, you know that?”

“You’re just jealous ‘cause you can’t bake.”

He opens his mouth, maybe to say something like _Keyblade Masters don’t bake._ But he’s still nursing a burn from Aqua’s surprise Fira from the morning, and she watches that memory flicker in his eyes before he sighs and says, “Whatever.”

Aqua decides that’s good enough, and brings a cut brownie over to him. “Since you don’t like super sweet things. I’m sorry I hurt you in training.”

His eyes go so wide that she almost laughs—almost, because this is supposed to be a serious moment. She doesn’t bake things for just anybody.

“It’s… it’s okay,” he says, and nibbles on the corner.

She watches him eagerly, and smiles when he licks his lips. He finishes the brownie and sighs, fully satisfied. Aqua leans forward. “You’re supposed to say thanks,” she stage-whispers.

Terra smirks. “I thought it was a gift.”

“I mean, yeah, but it’s good manners. Master Eraqus says so.”

They both turn, as if expecting their Master to appear out of the shadows. He does not; it doesn’t stop Terra from keeping his eyes to the door as he jumps off the table. “Well, thanks.”

She swallows down _well that wasn’t very hard, was it?_ because this _was_ a gift. “You’re welcome,” she says.

“Can I have another?”

She takes that as victory enough and nods before grabbing a brownie of her own.

+

He’s twelve when he picks up whittling from the old carver in Cable Town. The very first thing he carves is a dog who liked to stare at them from the open shop window, all sharp and huge brown eyes. It comes out looking more like an angry cat than a Doberman but he’s pleased with himself.

Terra stops teasing Aqua about her baking pretty quickly after that, because her words make sense: there’s something special about making something with his hands. Soon they establish a routine: after training they go into the kitchen, and Terra sets up his little station with his tools and a piece of cloth to catch the splinters while Aqua gathers her ingredients. She watches him as she waits for her pastries to bake, always making sure to have a Terra-friendly option for him to snack on once they’re done.

He likes making dynamic things—animals up on their paws ready to attack, birds with their wings outstretched, spiral shapes. He doesn’t have an eye for color and doesn’t paint them; he likes the look of the wood grains swirling, thinks it’s easier to see the artistry without that mask. He’s fourteen when he’s confident enough to start saving the bulk of his projects instead of feeding them to the fireplace; a year later, he decides to make them with the intent of giving them away.

Ven is his first test subject; it’s easier to impress a kid who still gets excited by simple things like birds in flight. He makes a sparrow with its mouth open in song and gives it to Ven late at night, like a secret. Ven carries it in his hand everywhere outside of training, until the wood bends under his touch—even then it has a seat of honor on Ven’s bedside table, a quiet guardian in the night.

He tries something different for Aqua.

It’s easy enough to steal one of her wooden spoons, to get the general shape of it right. It’s carving the details on the handle that takes time. He’s mostly mastered the art of “not cutting himself” but wears gloves anyway, because splinters, and uses magnifying glasses to get the flow of everything just right. He carves vines and flowers, roses with thorns, hints of creatures with their eyes hidden in the tangles, and burns little lines in for that pop of contrast. (It’s also a good excuse to finesse his Fire spell, which hey, two birds with one stone.) Terra makes a whole set of spoons and spatula handles, even a container to keep them all in.

He strikes when she’s in the library one night, buried deep in autobiographies of old Masters who had studied and taught before them. Terra hides her old set on top of the refrigerator, silently pleased with himself. He debates tying it up with a red ribbon just for that wow factor, but decides against it. He doesn’t leave a note either, because he knows that she’ll know right where it came from.

Morning comes with a fist banging loudly on Terra’s door. His hands are rug-burn red when he finally stumbles, opening to a red-faced, teary Aqua. He’s wide awake when he asks, “Wh-What’s happened?”

“ _You_ happened, you jerk!”

And he remembers. Terra, still a little groggy-eyed, leans against the doorframe with his arms crossed. “What’d I do this time?”

“Made me,” she begins, and sniffs. “How’d you even—”

“That’s the point of a gift, right?” he says. “You aren’t supposed to expect it.”

“I,” she starts, and takes a breath. “Didn’t. At all. It was… they’re _beautiful._ I didn’t know you could carve like that.”

He wants to say, _neither did I_ , but it’s rare that she praises him like this—hell, it’s rare for her to cry like this at all, when she’s usually so poised and collected. “But… yeah, they’re yours. Think of me the next time you make brownies.”

She blinks at that, bewildered. Then she’s laughing, and _he’s_ laughing, his chest warm. Aqua  nods, curling a lock of blue hair around her finger. “I will.”

A memory comes back to him. He smirks. “Aren’t you supposed to say thanks after getting a gift?”

She wipes the tears from her eyes. “Yeah. Yeah, here.”

He has all of two seconds to note the strange gleam in her eyes before she kisses him. Just a little peck on the cheek, but it stirs him into waking better than any cup of coffee. She’s pulled back before he has a chance to react, her face flushed red. “Juh,” he says, and his eyes feel like they’re about to come right out of his skull because _what the hell._

“Just—a friend kiss,” she stammers, and walks away from him without another word.

Ven finds him half an hour later, still sputtering.

+

He doesn’t know how old they are. They should be thirty-four and twenty-nine—thirteen years have passed since their first clash with Xehanort—but he doesn’t… he doesn’t feel it. By now he should have lived a little, fully settled into his Mastership, maybe raised an apprentice on his own; instead he’s relearning how to talk and fight and be like himself again.

And cooking… he’d be lying if he said he was _re_ learning this.

“You’re sure these have to be homemade?” Ven asks, looking down at an egg bowl filled with more egg shell than yolk. Aerith’s _Baking for Beginners_ is sitting on a stand in front of him, with pictures in primary colors and large type. “There’s a really good bakery just down the road from here.”

“I’m sure, Ven,” he says, and looks down. He added the baking powder to this already, right? Is adding more a bad thing? The book, designed for children, doesn’t say. There’s probably a note in there about _only baking under adult supervision_ , meaning someone who knows. No one from the Restoration Committee is in for him to ask, or panic about the state of their small kitchen. “Fish out as much of the shell as you can from that. You have the chocolate chips ready?”

They’re covered in mix by the time the cookies are in the oven, but neither minds; baking fiascos are the kinds of crises they can handle. Ven, who seems to be growing half an inch a day to make up for years of suspended animation, is still short enough to have to look up at him. He smiles. “You think these’ll be ready by the time Dr. Sweet is done?”

“Should be,” he says, and looks upstairs. He doesn’t think about the final battle and the heavy damage Aqua sustained, just that the best doctors and healers are working to get her back to her normal state. She’s moving more, keeping bigger portions of her meals down. Last he’d heard, she could expect to be released from bed rest by the end of the week. He shakes the thought away and turns back to Ven. “You’re doing okay?”

“Yeah,” he says, the word bright despite his frown. “Just worried.”

“She’ll make it through.”

“Not just about her. You, too.” Terra doesn’t remember Ven’s eyes being this piercing, this haunted. “Riku told me what happened yesterday.”

Terra turns away. “Just a set back. I have it handled.” He scrubs his face again with the moist hand towel and hands it to Ven. “Wash your face off.”

“I’m not a kid, Terra,” he says, but wipes his sticky face anyway. “And I worry. Aqua worries, too. Though—”

“Aqua always worries,” they say together, and chuckle.

But he can’t be mad at her for it—or Ven, for that matter. The point of them being back after the hell they’d been through was for them to worry about and be worried for each other. To meddle. To talk. “I just… the longer I work with Riku to control this, the better things will be. For all of us, I think, and the worlds. And I know I have you both to help me.”

“You’ll let us help this time?” Ven asks.

Terra nods.

The buzzer goes off; have ten minutes passed already? Ven speeds away to grab the oven mitts and pull the cookies out of the oven. They look… cookie-esque, which was more than he’d dared hope for. Ven, too impatient to wait for them to cool, puts six on a plate and carries it upstairs. Terra is quick to follow.

Aqua is the last person who deserves bed rest—she’s too vibrant for that, too kinetic. She certainly seems to look better though, with more color in her face and meals in her system. Dr. Sweet is packing up his supplies beside her, and is the first to greet them. “Afternoon, fellas. Looks like you kept yourselves busy.”

She looks up at them with sleepy eyes—they widen quickly when she sees the cookies. “Are those for me?”

“Fresh out of the oven!” Ven declares, and pulls up a chair on Aqua’s other side. “Terra insisted.”

“Homemade is extra special,” he says, and smiles at her.

He’s lost so many of his memories that it’s a near miracle he remembers that day with the brownies. Apparently Aqua remembers too, if the slow-building smile stretching across her face is anything to go by. “Dr. Sweet, would you like one?”

The dark-skinned doctor flashes a smile. “Nah, I’m gonna pass. Thanks, though. I’ll see you day after tomorrow,” he says, and waves as he heads back down the stairs.

“More for us,” Ven says. “So?”

Aqua meets Terra’s eyes for a moment, brow quirked. He shrugs. She takes an enthusiastic bite anyway. She pauses before swallowing it down. “They’re…”

“Not burned?” Terra adds helpfully.

“ _Salty._ How much did you put in?”

He blinks. “Uh…”

“Please don’t tell me you added salt instead of flour.”

“ _Terra_ ,” Ven whines. “We have another dozen downstairs!”

“Baking isn’t my specialty!” he says, his cheeks flushing red. “And it’s not like we could taste the mix before we baked it.”

“Well what are we supposed to _do!_ ”

“Leave them for the animals, I don’t know!”

Aqua sinks back into the bed, giggling hard; Ven is quick to join her. He smiles and settles close to Aqua’s head. If he notices Aqua’s hand finding its way into his, or the light squeeze she gives him, he doesn’t say anything about it.

+

The three of them eventually decide on twenty-six and twenty-one. It feels closer to the truth than their “real” ages.

When Aqua, Sora, and Riku had gone to awaken Ventus from his slumber, they had unknowingly “reset” the Land of Departure to its original state. It doesn’t stop Eraqus’s students from making further improvements: strengthening and polishing the massive chains linking the castle to the surrounding mountains; reorganizing the libraries and cataloging their contents; establishing guest rooms for the other Keyblade wielders, and the apprentices who may come after them. They spend long morning reminiscing about Eraqus, the only thing missing that they cannot easily replace.

Terra doesn’t quite remember when he gives Aqua the first nightlight to chase away the pettiest of her nightmares, when “I’ll sleep in your room to make sure you feel safe” becomes “please don’t hog the sheets again” to “let’s just move into my room, I have the bigger bed”—all he knows is that one day he wakes up with Aqua’s hair in his mouth, her cold nose pressed into his collarbone, and finds he wouldn’t mind making this a permanent thing.

(He doesn’t say this to her. Just thinks it. Even that’s enough to make him fall for her that much more.)

The first snowfall finds the three of them in better spirits than normal, flush-faced and giggly after a long night of sipping hot chocolate. They retire slowly, one right after the other; Terra stays behind the clean the mugs, grateful for something to do. There are still moments when he loses control of his hands—there are plenty of chipped dishes to attest to that—but he manages this round of washing without any new damage. It’s satisfying. It lets him know he’s moving forward.

Terra knows Aqua’s waiting for him just by the candles flickering from his cabinets. She waits in his bed, her hair damp and face red from a hot shower, with a book in her hands. There’s plenty of room for them to spread out in his king-sized bed; it doesn’t stop him from scooting close to her, trying to keep his cold toes away from her ankles. “What’re you reading?”

“Journal from a student who studied here two-hundred years ago,” she says. She marks her place with a paper bookmark Ven had given her as a present years ago and turns to him. “You took a while.”

“Just dishes,” he says. “All clean.”

She smiles, shifting to her side. “I went into the pantry this morning by myself. No flashlight or anything.”

Maybe it’s because of the candlelight, or her body warm against his, but he remembers that morning with her hair in his mouth and smiles. “That’s awesome. Sounds like you’re getting better.”

Aqua blinks at him. “I guess I am,” she says, and swallows hard.

He frowns. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, just… I think we agreed that you only had to do this until I felt better. So if—if you need me to go back in my room, I can—”

“No!” he says, too loud for the candles glowing around them. He tries again. “No, I… I like having you, uh, here.” He closes his eyes. “With me. You know?”

Her fingers find his under the blankets. A few months of rest have softened the calluses on her hands; they’re still painfully rough, especially compared to his. He opens his eyes to find her staring at him. “I do.”

Do what? He sighs. “I won’t stop you if you wanted to go, but I… Aqua?”

She moves slowly, so he can watch her lean forward. They’re twenty-six and twenty-one and maybe fifteen again when she kisses him. On the mouth this time, her lips soft and warm and searching. He’s slow to reciprocate but finally does push his mouth against hers. He smiles and moves his head so their teeth clack together—it’s a hard sound, especially in the otherwise quiet bedroom. Aqua just laughs and readjusts them, running her fingers through his hair. For a moment he’s tempted to snuff out the lights, to throw open the door; he’s getting too warm too quickly, but the thought of moving feels wrong.

They finally part with kiss-swollen lips and soft laughs. Terra teases the ends of Aqua’s hair between his fingertips. “How long have you been waiting to do that?”

“Since we were kids.”

“You should’ve said something.”

“I did. I kissed you after you gave me those spoons,” she tells him. “I was waiting for _you_ to say something else _._ ”

“You know I’m a rockhead when it comes to stuff like this.”

“Speaking of,” Aqua says. “Hang on.”

She leans away to grab something else off her bedside table, leaving him breathless. “Tell me you didn’t get a themed present for this.”

“It’s a happy accident,” she says, and hands him a tube.

He takes one look at it and laughs. “This is toothpaste _._ ”

“You were running out! And if we’re going to be doing this, we need to make sure we’re… don’t laugh,” she says, as he dissolves into laughter.

“And somehow I’m the rockhead?”

“Just say thank you,” she pouts.

He places the toothpaste on his side table, still fighting laughter. “Thanks for the dumb gift, hypocrite.”

“You’re very welcome,” she says, and kisses him again.

+

The worlds have stabilized after three tumultuous years, after realizing their places in a greater World. Gone are the days where progress is made by slamming Keyblades into Heartless and other creatures, replaced by diplomatic strategy. The Restoration Committee has branches in other worlds now, all focused on a common goal. It's given them all time to take a breath and regroup before starting in again. Everyone is happier for it.

The Keyblade’s chosen rarely get “vacations” in the traditional sense, but Ven manages to swing a day off and takes them to a hidden market deep in the center of Radiant Garden. People dance in colorful dresses and flowing shirts—she recognizes several patterns from the Dwarf Woodlands, from San Fransokyo, and marvels how quickly traditions spread outward. Ven pulls her into a line dance and she laughs loudly; he pulls Terra into a drinking contest and laughs harder, smiles brighter.

Terra pulls her to the side when Ventus commands the street’s attention with an intricate, spiraling dance, guides her by the hand into the open main street. And even farther, past the shops closing for the evening and the restaurants noisy with patrons and sizzling meat, until they turn into a main plaza.

It takes her a moment to recognize the space as the scene of that last great fight before they’d fallen into the Realm of Darkness. Someone has strung paper lanterns from the lamp posts, has brought a fiddler to play music. A young couple dances in the center, her white dress flaring out behind her as they twirl in tight circles. Aqua leans against Terra’s shoulder, smiling softly. “Did you know this was happening?”

“I overheard the groom this afternoon,” he admits.

“The world really is changing, isn’t it?”

Terra is slow to respond. “It’s good to see it used for something happy.” As if to prove his point the guests begin throwing fistfuls of rice on the dancing couple, crying out innuendos and well wishes. “Do they even know?”

She hopes they don’t; she hopes that the people who had known no longer remember.

They make no move to join the festivities, becoming ghosts in the shadows. The fiddler transitions effortlessly to a slow song, and as if by silent command the crowd moves to press against the short stone walls (right where she’d been pinned, once upon a time, and battered with Dark Volleys) to give the couple some room. He takes her in his arms as they sway softly, their foreheads pressed together. Even from here she can see the bride smile.

“Her dress is beautiful,” she says, watching the fabric flicker in the lamplight.

Terra shifts beside her. “Would you… would you ever want to wear one?”

“Dresses aren’t ideal for,” she starts to say, and pauses. She looks up to see him staring out at the dancing couple, but this close she can see his jaw clenched, beads of sweat beginning to form on his brow. “What do you mean?”

He swallows hard and doesn’t meet her eyes. “Is that something you want to do?”

She swears she can hear the heart of Radiant Garden beat under her feet as she takes a steadying breath. Aqua grabs his hand even harder, in case she falls over. “Getting married?” she asks, more whisper than word.

“Just, you know, whenever you felt ready.” His eyes are glistening when he finally turns to her. “I’ve been thinking and I, ah… I’d like to be with you. Like that.” He takes a deep breath. “And I know it’s not traditional for Keyblade wielders, but the World has changed, so maybe… I don’t know. We never followed the rules anyway.”

Part of her knows she’s crying. Part of her knows she’s laughing. But she doesn’t really understand that she’s crying and laughing until she wipes her hand across her wet, pinched cheek. Terra looks like he’s about to faint, and for some reason that only makes her laugh harder. “I—Aqua, I was just thinking out loud, we don’t—”

“This is just like the damn spoons again,” she laughs, and hugs him tight. She doesn’t care if she’s staining his shirt with tears and snot, or that he’s laughing too. His heart is right in her ear and beating loud and hard. She looks up, sniffs, and nods. “You caught me off guard, I…”

“Sorry,” he says again, but he doesn’t look it: there’s a bright, hopeful gleam to his blue eyes, brilliance in his laugh. “But, uh… would you…?”

“Of course I would,” she says immediately, and kisses him. And keeps kissing him until her world is spinning from lack of oxygen. She pulls away reluctantly, her hands joined behind his neck. “Do you have a ring?”

“Ven’s going to kill me,” he laughs, but digs into his pocket. The velvet box is small, and his hands shake so badly that she’s scared he’ll drop it. But he manages to open it, revealing a thick silver band with a glimmering  stone in the center. “You’ll probably want to put a spell on it, so the stone doesn’t break.”

She brushes her thumb against it, feeling the small pricks of raised metal holding the jewel in place. “You picked this out?”

“Ven helped, but… yeah,” he says. “I thought about making one myself but didn’t want it to come out like my cookies.”

Aqua laughs as she wipes away the last few tears, knowing full well that more will come to take their places. “Is he going to be sad if we go back to the party with this on my finger?”

He chuckles. “I think he’ll be happy that I finally asked.”

She gives Terra her left hand and watches the ring go on. She’s not used to wearing jewelry out in the open—too often it gets in the way of fighting—but she’ll make an exception for this. “Then we should let him know he can stop waiting.”

Terra gives her one last kiss, gently threading his fingers into hers. “C’mon,” he says, and they walk back into the light.

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to yell at me on tumblr @awakingdormancy :")


End file.
